A group of doctors contends the latest film by Japanese animation maestro, Hayao Miyazaki, has a nasty habit–an addiction to smoking.

The Japan Society for Tobacco Control, an anti-smoking organization comprised of physicians, this week criticized “The Wind Rises” for its frequent portrayals of tobacco use.

In a notice to the film’s production company, Studio Ghibli, the group said the smoking scenes are so pervasive, it’s difficult to keep count. The film depicts smoking as socially acceptable, whether it is at a teacher’s lounge or an upscale resort, the doctors said.

The group’s call echoes those made by other anti-smoking groups in recent years urging Hollywood to reduce portrayals of tobacco use on the big screen that may promote smoking to children. Walt Disney extinguished smoking in its films in 2007.

Set in the 1920s and 1930s in the run-up to World War II, the film’s portrayal of a casual attitude toward smoking is historically accurate. But the doctors say some of the smoking was unnecessary detail.

It cited as particularly problematic the scene when the main character, an engineer, smoked as he held the hand of his lover, bedridden with tuberculosis.

“Why did smoking have to be included in a scene where the objective is to depict the couple’s relationship, especially the woman’s state of mind? There must have been another way to express that,” the notice said.

It also criticized the copious scenes of students bumming cigarettes off one another, arguing it sends the wrong message to the many children who will watch the film.

“Is it right for a famous company that anyone knows to ignore the law?” the notice asked. The legal smoking age in Japan is 20.

Many of Studio Ghibli’s films, like “My Neighbor Totoro” and “Spirited Away, are in Japan’s canon of great children’s movies, and renowned for their mix of whimsical fantasy and nostalgia for a simpler place. “The Wind Rises” is one of Mr. Miyazaki’s more somber works, based on the life of Jiro Horikoshi, the engineer who designed famed Zero fighter plane that was ultimately used in the Pearl Harbor attack and kamikaze suicide missions.